Evidence suggest clinical IT executives have a notable impact on a healthcare organization’s IT orientation

March 14, 2016 — As the healthcare industry evolves from a volume- to a value-based payment system, clinical information technology (IT) executives are expected to play an increasingly significant role in ensuring health IT is appropriately leveraged to positively impact care outcomes. Evidence from the 2016 HIMSS Leadership Survey, released at the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) annual conference and exhibition in Las Vegas, clearly support these expectations.

For the past 27 years, HIMSS has conducted the annual Leadership Survey as a means to identify and monitor generalized trends within the U.S. healthcare IT marketplace. Reflecting responses from individuals representing a cross-section of healthcare provider organizations and healthcare executives, the 27th Annual HIMSS Leadership Survey again yielded a myriad of valuable insights. Yet it was the findings involving the role and impact of clinical IT executives that have arguably generated the most interest.

Beginning with the observation that the vast majority of respondents associated health IT as a strategically critical tool to help a healthcare organization’s patient care-focused efforts, researchers explored variances in survey responses based on whether the respondent’s organization employed (71 percent) or did not employ a clinical IT executive. This analysis generated remarkable differences on a multitude of issues, leading researchers to conclude that the presence of a clinical IT executive in a healthcare provider organization appears to have a notable impact on the organization’s orientation towards health IT.

“Clinical IT executives clearly possess a unique and valued perspective regarding the criticality of health IT on an organization’s patient care-focused efforts, and this orientation appears to be gaining traction in many organizations” said Lorren Pettit, vice president, research for HIMSS. “And while clinical IT executives are part of the overall executive team in many healthcare organizations, their presence is not universally true. We will definitely continue to explore and track these issues in future HIMSS research studies.”

The Leadership Survey reflects the responses of 282 IT executives and professionals in U.S. hospitals and health systems with regard to their organization’s IT environment.